What is URBAN DESIGN / Famous URBAN DESIGNERS and there THEORY with PDF

Summary

Urban design is an interdisciplinary field focused on creating equitable, beautiful, and sustainable environments. It integrates architecture, landscape design, and urban planning to address public spaces, social equity, and economic viability. Influential theorists like Christopher Alexander and Jane Jacobs have shaped the field, which now encompasses subfields like strategic urban design and sustainable urbanism. Urban design aims to enhance the human experience by connecting people with places, movement, and nature.

Takeaways

• 🏙️ Urban design is the process of shaping the physical features of cities, towns, and villages, and planning for municipal services.
• 🔗 It is interdependent with architecture and is often referred to as 'relational design', highlighting the connection between the two fields.
• 🌐 Urban design is an interdisciplinary field, incorporating elements from architecture, landscape design, urban planning, civil engineering, and more.
• 📚 It requires knowledge from a wide range of disciplines, including public administration, sociology, law, urban geography, and economics.
• 🌱 Emerging subfields of urban design include strategic urban design, landscape urbanism, water sensitive urban design, and sustainable urbanism.
• 🧩 Urban design is about making connections between people and places, movement, urban form, nature, and the built environment.
• 🎨 It aims to create places with distinct beauty and identity by integrating place making, environmental stewardship, social equity, and economic viability.
• 🏛️ Urban design theory primarily deals with the design and management of public space, including streets, plazas, parks, and public infrastructure.
• 📖 Influential writers on urban design theory include Christopher Alexander, Jane Jacobs, Kevin Lynch, and Aldo Rossi, among others.
• 🛠️ Urban design activities range from large master plans to detailed design for local streets, with a focus on human scale, ease of use, and long-term value.
• 💡 Well-designed urban environments should function well, be attractive, durable, and cost-effective, adding economic, social, and environmental value without necessarily increasing costs.

Q & A

What is urban design and what does it encompass?

Urban design is the process of designing and shaping the physical features of cities, towns, and villages, and planning for the provision of municipal services. It deals with larger scale issues than architecture but is closely linked to it, focusing on groups of buildings, infrastructure, streets, public spaces, neighborhoods, districts, and entire cities with the goal of creating equitable, beautiful, performative, and sustainable urban environments.

How is urban design related to architecture?

Urban design and architecture are inextricably linked due to their interdependency. The quality of one impacts the other, and this relationship is known as relational design, a concept introduced by architect Enric Miralles Bosch.

What are the goals of urban design in creating urban environments?

The goals of urban design are to create urban environments that are equitable, beautiful, performative, and sustainable, ensuring that they serve the needs of residents and visitors effectively.

How is urban design an interdisciplinary field?

Urban design is interdisciplinary as it utilizes procedures and elements from architecture and related professions such as landscape design, urban planning, civil engineering, and draws from knowledge in public administration, sociology, law, urban geography, urban economics, and other social and natural sciences.

What are some subfields of urban design that have emerged recently?

Some emerging subfields of urban design include strategic urban design, landscape urbanism, water sensitive urban design, and sustainable urbanism.

What subjects does urban design demand an understanding of?

Urban design demands an understanding of a wide range of subjects including physical geography, social science, real estate development, urban economics, political economy, and social theory.

What does urban design aim to connect in the context of cities?

Urban design aims to connect people and places, movement and urban form, nature, and the built fabric, integrating these elements to create places with distinct beauty and identity.

What are the components of urban design theory?

Urban design theory primarily deals with the design and management of public space, including public environment, public realm, or public domain, and the way public places are used and experienced.

Which aspects of privately owned spaces contribute to public space in urban design?

Aspects of privately owned spaces such as building facades or domestic gardens contribute to public space and are considered in urban design theory.

Can you name some important writers on urban design theory?

Important writers on urban design theory include Christopher Alexander, Peter Calthorpe, Gordon Cullen, Andrus Dwane, Jane Jacobs, Michelle Jose, Jan Gehl, Alan B. Jacobs, Kevin Lynch, Aldo Rossi, Colin Rowe, William H. Whyte, Camilo Citta, Bill Hillier, and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk.

What range of activities does urban design cover?

Urban design covers a range of activities from drawing up large master plans to detailed design for a local street, with a common concern for designing at the human scale, ease of use, and creating attractive places that remain valuable over time.

How does urban design approach the economic, social, and environmental value of projects?

Urban design adds economic, social, and environmental value to projects by taking a broader view than many other professions and considering these aspects at an early stage in each project.